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    Tales from 1978-79 Alabama Football: A Time of Champions
    Tales from 1978-79 Alabama Football: A Time of Champions
    Tales from 1978-79 Alabama Football: A Time of Champions
    Ebook216 pages

    Tales from 1978-79 Alabama Football: A Time of Champions

    By Steven Townsend

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    About this ebook

    If there was ever a sequence of plays that epitomized the steely resolution Paul William Bryant instilled in his football teams, it occurred in the fourth quarter of the 1979 Sugar Bowl in the national championship showdown with No. 1 Penn State. Those plays, forever commemorated in Crimson Tide football lore by timeless photos, paintings and video images, highlighted the Bryant canons of football and life: sacrifice, teamwork, pride, poise, confidence, determination and a sheer will to win. Although a quarter-century has now elapsed since those last two national championship seasons, Alabama fans have hardly relinquished the memories of a glorious past. Tales of the 1978-79 Alabama Football: A Time of Champion is a collection of behind-the-scenes stories and incidents that separated the Crimson Tide from the rest of the college football world during the high-tide times of Coach Bryant and his teams. It's about intimate moments with Coach Bryant with close friends, his staff and his players. It's about the coaches and players, and it's about being No. 1.

    Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Sports Publishing imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in sportsbooks about baseball, pro football, college football, pro and college basketball, hockey, or soccer, we have a book about your sport or your team.

    Whether you are a New York Yankees fan or hail from Red Sox nation; whether you are a die-hard Green Bay Packers or Dallas Cowboys fan; whether you root for the Kentucky Wildcats, Louisville Cardinals, UCLA Bruins, or Kansas Jayhawks; whether you route for the Boston Bruins, Toronto Maple Leafs, Montreal Canadiens, or Los Angeles Kings; we have a book for you. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to publishing books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked by other publishers and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSports Publishing
    Release dateJan 31, 2012
    ISBN9781613214923
    Tales from 1978-79 Alabama Football: A Time of Champions

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      Book preview

      Tales from 1978-79 Alabama Football - Steven Townsend

      Prologue

      As the sun descended behind ever-amassing clouds that shrouded the New Orleans skyline, the citizens and visitors to the Crescent City were already reveling on the streets, celebrating the final hours of 1978 and the birth of a new year, 1979, indifferent to the reports of an imminent and a pronounced rainstorm that was rapidly approaching from the west.

      Aruns Callery, the backbone of the Sugar Bowl and a close personal friend of Coach Paul Bryant, and I entered the legendary coach’s hotel suite high atop the Hyatt Regency to pay an early evening visit and to check on him one final time before Alabama's national championship showdown with Penn State the next day.

      As we entered the room, the coach, outwardly relaxed but with his stomach certainly churning in anticipation of yet another football war, sat at an elegant table lined with telegrams of well-wishes, sharing a moment of camaraderie with three of his closest friends in the media, Alf Van Hoose of the Birmingham News, Al Browning of the Tuscaloosa News, and forever the Voice of the Crimson Tide, John Forney.

      Bryant’s longtime security aide Billy Varner stood guard outside the suite’s main entrance, and an hour or so after we had settled in chairs near the coach and his other visitors, a knock on the door signaled the arrival of the head trainer and aide-de-camp Jim Goostree, who was there to give the coach one final injury and illness update.

      There were no buildings between those two high-rises back then, and the coach, his stature immense, his charisma immeasurable, rose from his seat and shuffled slowly to the dark windows, peering out at the street lights that illuminated a city on one of its biggest party nights of the year.

      With glasses atop his head, an unlit pipe clenched in his teeth and knowing Goose’s arrival served as a cue for us to exit, Van

      With the 1:00 p.m. kickoff less than 18 hours away, Bryant stared out the window, seemingly for an interminable period of time, before answering to all of us, or none of us, maybe to all the fans wishing to know his response or perhaps just to himself.

      It’ll be like all big games. Probably, come down to a big play or two in the fourth quarter, and the team that makes ‘em will go home happy and the team that doesn’t will always wonder what they could have done differently. I just hope and pray tomorrow Alabama makes those plays.

      Chapter 1

      What Happened Behind the Scenes

      I have to do what is best for the Southeastern Conference.

      —Paul Bryant to SEC commissioner H. Boyd McWhorter and the Sugar Bowl’s Aruns Callery

      If not for Paul William Bryant’s close personal friendship with New Orleans’ Aruns Callery, a member of the Sugar Bowl Committee, it is questionable whether there would have been any celebrations in the Crescent City by Alabama fans after the 1979 and 1980 postseason events.

      Actually, the process of uniting the SEC and the Sugar Bowl began in the spring of 1975 when Bryant informed Callery that he thought he was going to have a good team and he wanted to play a prominent opponent in the first ever Sugar Bowl in the newly built Superdome. During that time Alabama was about the only conference team that could name its annual bowl ticket, and the SEC had no contract with the Sugar, much less any other bowl.

      When Paul told you something, you didn’t even need a handshake, said Callery. I was feeling pretty good, knowing we were going to get Alabama before the season ever started in ‘75. Indeed, the Tide finished 10-1 and after numerous phone calls to Joe Paterno, Callery had secured the matchup Bryant had wanted back in the spring.

      The 13-6 Alabama victory on December 31, 1975, would serve as a precursor of an even more titanic battle three years later. A few months after the first Sugar Bowl in the Dome, Callery approached SEC commissioner McWhorter with the idea of the SEC champion being locked into the Sugar Bowl.

      You’ll never get it passed, said McWhorter. Coach Bryant will never go for it, because he doesn’t need the Sugar Bowl. And he didn’t and Callery knew it, but he persisted anyway.

      When I first brought the topic up with Paul, he wasn’t too keen on it, remembered Callery. He told me that just about every year he could go to either the Cotton, Orange or Sugar, and he liked taking his teams to different spots every year.

      After mulling over the idea for a few weeks, Bryant called Callery back, telling him he had reconsidered the proposal. He said, Aruns, I’ve got to think about the rest of the conference and this is the best thing for the rest of them’, recalled Callery. At the SEC March meeting in 1976, the league approved the recommendation at its session in Savannah, Ga.

      There was one clause in the contract that almost haunted Bryant and his Crimson Tide during its championship seasons, a last-appearance rule, which coincided with the Big 10’s regulation for the Rose Bowl. In both 1978 and 1979, Alabama almost lost out on Sugar Bowl invitations because of that stipulation that would ultimately be lifted after the 1979 season and cost the Tide a final Bryant appearance in the New Orleans Classic after the 1981 season, a season in which Georgia and Herschel Walker tied the Tide for first in the league. The Bulldogs, much to Callery’s dismay, were offered the bid over Alabama.

      January 3, 1978

      Alabama players were disconsolate over the news that their 35-6 romp over Ohio State the day before, Monday, January 2, had not been enough to catapult the Crimson Tide into the No. 1 spot.

      I always thought someone else was wearing my championship ring, said safety Murray Legg, who had played a prominent role in the 11-1 season and would become an even more valuable member of the ‘78 team. When we started our winter workouts on January 16, there was a determination that we wouldn’t let this happen again.

      Every player who went through the dreaded winter conditioning drills agreed the sweat and toil they endured under the strict guidance of Ken Donahue and Jim Goostree would serve as a lasting reminder that no matter how bad a situation may seem on the field, they would will themselves to do as Coach Bryant preached to them, Gut check — a euphemism for digging deep inside oneself in the most dire situation and finding a way to win.

      Let’s put it this way, there was no team in better condition or mentally tougher than us, said Jeff Rouzie, a linebacker coach on the championship team and a former star linebacker for Bryant. Other teams may have had better athletes, but none were tougher than Alabama.

      We were not always the most gifted athletically, said halfback Major Ogilvie. But we were a team, and the team was built in the lower gym of Memorial Coliseum in the winter months. Heck, everything was easier after that.

      May, 1978

      ABC-TV had complete rights to all NCAA football in the 1970s, and the rule stated explicitly that a team could appear during the regular season a total of five times over a two-year period.

      With a schedule featuring Nebraska, Missouri, Southern California and Washington in the non-league, the Tide was ripe for the plucking by ABC. On May 21, ABC officials finalized a deal that would move the Alabama-Nebraska game from November 18 to September 2 for a prime-time national telecast.

      Already having an open date before Auburn, the switch of the Cornhusker game signaled another oddity: two open dates before the traditional season ender.

      Bryant offered this spiel about the schedule: We are pleased to open the season for TV. Certainly, as a football coach I’m not too happy with the athletic director who made up this schedule, but I’m hopeful we’ll be able to compete somehow against those teams. Of course, Bryant served in a dual role as head coach and athletic director.

      August, 1978

      At the annual Skywriters’ Tour, Jack Hairston of the Gainesville Sun asked Coach Bryant if he could take a moment to talk about the Alabama team before Bryant did. The coach nodded, knowing some spoof was about to occur.

      Mimicking Bryant’s mumbling delivery, Hairston outlined the Alabama team and closed by saying, As you can see we aren’t going to be very good and we’ll probably end up going 1-10 but playing in the Sugar Bowl for the national title. Bryant joined the rounds of laughter.

      In his retort, Bryant asked, Jack, how do you know so much about my team? With the return of such ‘77 luminaries as quarterback Jeff Rutledge, running back Tony Nathan, center Dwight Stephenson, and tackle Jim Bunch, the Tide offense was expected to be very good, though the loss of wide receiver Ozzie Newsome and fullback Johnny Davis left a dent in the offense, as did the loss of three starting offensive linemen: Bob Cryder, Lou Green and David Sadler.

      Defensively, the Tide’s losses were significant in the secondary with the departure of halfback Mike Tucker and safety Mike Kramer. Noseguard Terry Jones was on his way to the pros with Newsome, Davis and Cryder, while end Dewey Mitchell had also completed his eligibility. Despite the losses, the expectation level was feverish in Tuscaloosa.

      Coach Paul Bryant with his close friend Aruns Callery of the Sugar Bowl.

      (Photo courtesy of Paul Bryant Museum)

      The first AP poll for the 1978 season was released in August, and Alabama was locked in the No. 1 spot followed by Arkansas, convincing winners over Oklahoma in the ‘78 Orange Bowl.

      Keith Jackson and his ABC crew arrived in Birmingham on Thursday, August 31 to prepare for the Alabama-Nebraska game, and the self-proclaimed Football Capital of the South brimmed with eager anticipation of the ‘78 season.

      Chapter 2

      The Tide Shucks the Huskers

      "Walking off the field at Nebraska last year, their fans were

      hollering at me pretty good, telling me to throw some more

      interceptions. This game certainly erases any memories of that."

      —Jeff Rutledge after the 20-3 win over Nebraska

      The Drive

      It was a season that started with the drive and culminated with the goal-line stand, and if it hadn’t been for that drive, then there may have never been that stand.

      Early in the second quarter of the Nebraska game and trailing 3-0 courtesy of a 48-yard field goal by Billy Todd, the Crimson Tide offense found itself literally a couple of inches from its own goal line after punter Tim Smith’s kick rolled close but not into the end zone.

      It was a drive that pretty much signified Coach Bryant’s iron resolution to win, said offensive coordinator Mai Moore. "Jeff Rutledge did a great job of leading us down the field, but we won it up front, just like all games are won.

      Jim Bunch, Buddy Aydelette, Dwight Stephenson, Vince Boothe, Mike Brock and Rick Neal were the guys up there and they just knocked Nebraska off the ball.

      Starting from the shadows of the north end zone, the Tide didn’t race down the field; it methodically rolled up yards as well as clipped time off the clock. Before the Tide eventually scored on the second completion of the march, a 10-yard pass from Rutledge to Major Ogilvie, there was a mere 3:06 left in the second quarter. It had taken 16 plays to do it, but Alabama had completed its longest drive. Fourteen of them were running plays, including chain-moving power runs by backup fullback Billy Jackson, who picked up 14 on a third and eight from the three-yard line and then 10 on third and seven from the Tide’s 20.

      Tony Nathan added runs of 12, 11 and 12 before Rutledge hit Bruce Bolton for 14 to continue the Tide’s roll down the field. Lou Ikner, subbing for Ogilvie, knifed through the defense for seven and six as the Tide neared the south end zone.

      We had third and goal from the four, and Major beat their defensive back [Andy Means] deep in the right corner of the end zone, said Rutledge. He made an over-the-shoulder catch. It was a great catch.

      The Redwood

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